


Forgot to Remember

by samii_senpai



Series: Forgot to Remember series [1]
Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Finished, Introspection, Loki is being sad in even more ways than before, Loki is remembering stuff, Loki is sad, Loki-centric, M/M, Now Edited, Poor Loki, Spoilers, Thor is there too, Thor: Ragnarok, aka loki has a time out, also: Irony, but he doesn't want to, no fluff just angst, now there is more content, surprise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-06
Updated: 2017-11-10
Packaged: 2019-01-30 06:43:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,247
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12648246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/samii_senpai/pseuds/samii_senpai
Summary: So, Thor really had lost all faith in him.He used to picture this moment in the back of his mind, thinking fondly of the day when he would finally rid himself of his annoying brother. He had thought it would feel much better than this.Because I just thought the scene in the elevator and what followed was kind of sad.(!!!!!!Spoilers for Thor: Ragnarok!!!!!!)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't edited this piece, so I apologize for any mistakes ahead of time.  
> If you happen to catch any please let me know!
> 
> Thank you and enjoy.
> 
> (11/8)  
> Because I posted this originally as soon as I finished writing it, I went back and edited.  
> Then I went back again and added more content.  
> (Surprise! hopefully it makes it better and not worse)
> 
> Again, Thanks and enjoy.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Because I first posted this story as soon as I was done writing it, I went back and edited it.  
> And then I added a little more content.  
> (hopefully this is to the benefit of the story)
> 
> Thank you and enjoy :)

So, Thor really had lost all faith in him.

He used to picture this moment in the back of his mind, thinking fondly of the day when he would finally rid himself of his annoying brother. He had thought it would feel much better than this.

Loki attempted to bury an unexpected, traitorous feeling that was beginning to surface. It felt curiously similar to betrayal (honestly, _what irony_ ). He could feel it like a tangible thing. A slow deep stab and the knife twisting as he listened to Thor agree with him, for the first time in an age, that maybe it would be for the best if he stayed behind. The one time they _actually_ _agree_ on something, to think it would be this.

And Loki _had_ wanted this. More than anything. It was the moment he was waiting for, the culmination of all his plotting and scheming. Every lie, every trick, was to lead him to rule…somewhere—anywhere—just so long as it was his. Be it Earth, Asgard, or this dump of a planet (although it wouldn’t be his first choice). And now he had it. Thor was telling him to do he pleased, without intervention. So why in the nine realms did he find himself needing to mask his face?

There was no way in Hel Loki could let his brother see that he was reacting in such a way.

Thor would laugh. No, that was wrong. Thor wouldn’t find the humour in this at all, though, it was kind of laughable, wasn’t it? Loki the Trickster, played by his own game? Thor wouldn’t think so. He would be angry. He would say something like: _‘How dare you speak of betrayal!’_ , and then, most likely throw around some lightning. The usual bit.

Loki frowned. If Thor really wanted him to stay, then should he? He rarely came to a time when he no longer knew what to do. In fact, the only other in recent memory was when he lost his mother.

He quickly pushed that particular memory back down. He needed a plan, but he could not think. This feeling was suffocating, burrowing itself deeper in between his ribs with each breath. Oh, how he could _feel_ it, sharp in his side, but he swallowed it deeper and thanked the creators that he was such a talented liesmith. He took his unwanted feeling and moulded it to something new, shaped by his own hand, then told himself it was different until he believed it.

Anger. That was something he could work with.

If Thor was so sure that he should remain, he would remain. But, he could not do so without a little insurance. There was no way the Grandmaster of this garbage planet would be welcoming him back without Loki returning with what had been demanded from him. If he was to feel betrayal, then he would make Thor feel it, too. Ten times over.

\-----

He set up the board perfectly, distracted Thor with a gesture straight from old times, and then struck at the precisely the right moment. He had planned everything, taken it all into account.

And he watched it crumble to pieces.

_Damn Thor. Damn him to Hel._ He had seen through everything. How had he not noticed when that bumbling oaf secured a tag to his back? Loki’s body thrashed uncontrollably as the currents set from that blasted device ran through him. He could faintly smell his hair frying. And it hurt. _Damn Thor. And damn fucking lightning._

Thor was looking rather pleased with himself. He sauntered over like he had all the time in the goddamn world and leaned over Loki’s jittering form to gloat. It was such a _Loki_ move. Honestly, if he hadn’t been lying on the floor writhing, he might’ve been proud.

Thor’s little speech seemed to go on and on. _Blah, blah, blah you won, now go away._ And he did, but not before making a show of throwing that blasted little remote that turns off the fucking taser stuck to his back. Then Loki watched, from the corner of his eye, as Thor boarded the ship he had just helped him steal and he was gone.

_Screw him_.

Some time passed as Loki lay there, shaking on the hard metal ground, not becoming any less aware of the pain he was in, and he realized that maybe it wasn’t Thor’s speech that had been droning on and on forever. Because, right now, it felt an awful lot like it was _time_ that was crawling by. An excruciating pace, really.

Maybe a bit ironically (because that seemed to be the theme of the day) he didn’t have long to despair over his first revelation, however. Because, by then, he was already realizing something else. And this something was even more punishing than the electricity currently using his body as a circuit.

Loki’s second revelation was: as he was unable to move save for his spasms, he now possessed only the ability to lay flat on his back and think, which would last for however much time it took for someone to come in here and find him. Thor, he knew, would not be returning for the likes of him, and the rest of Sakaar was in some sort of uprising. It was safe to say he wasn’t feeling too hopeful. Time, as it was, seemed to very much be against him.

It was like this that his torment unfolded and so, he thought, helplessly.

For a fair amount of time (which felt long but was impossible to determine), they were only thoughts which he could use to distract himself. Such as all the ways he was going to eviscerate Thor when he got out of this. His willpower was nothing to scoff at and he was childishly proud of his stubbornness. But, as it wore on (and on, and on, and on), pain and impatience worked just as stubbornly against him. His thoughts began to lead him in unwanted and completely unwelcome directions.

They lead him to Oden first. It was a logical place to begin if there were any since it was with Oden that this whole mess was caused.

Yes, Oden, the Allfather, father of Thor yet no father to him. Loki recalled the trip to Midgard where he’d left him, doped, under the most wicked spell he could think up to trap the mind of the once-king, to rot. Loki knew Thor blamed him for the death of his father and maybe he was right. Maybe fighting off that spell had taken everything that old man had left. He didn’t know if this was true, and he sure as Hel did not care about _Oden_ , but he couldn’t help but wonder… what if he _had_ killed him? If so, this ‘sister’ issue was his fault too. He would place a high bet against Thor in this fight. He had felt her power as she stood in front of them on Midgard. She was terrifying. If she was his fault and Thor couldn’t stop her… then he would be responsible for Thor’s death and for Asgard falling, too.

He was slightly horrified to find that it bothered him.

Hadn’t he wanted that in the past? Asgard falling and the chance to see Thor—his oh so mighty brother and God of Thunder, who everyone adored—defeated? And now that he was getting his way, albeit unintentionally, he was…what? Getting cold feet?

He thought of his mother, then, as he did when he allowed himself to feel lonely. He pictured her face in his mind’s eye and tried to make her smile, as if she were happy to see him, but could not. _Because she would not be happy. She would be disappointed._ Though Loki imagined she had to have been constantly in a state of disappointment with him, to the day she died.

The moment when Loki heard word of her death was the most painful memory he possessed. The fact at the time he had been caged like an animal was probably for the best if he was being honest. Loki had torn that cell to shreds while he screamed and raged like a man possessed. The men who were standing guard at his cell had turned their eyes away; if out of fear or sympathy, he knew not. Then, when he had finally regained his composure, he sat amongst the chaos he created and realized something vile. That _this_ had been his mother’s last image of him. Chained like a beast for unspeakable crimes against Midgard, and all in the name of petty revenge against Thor. Thinking of this, he had wept. And now, thinking of this again, he wanted to.

This was cruel. Thor was cruel. He was the cruellest person Loki ever met. Thor was supposed to always have faith in him. He was supposed to always argue for Loki’s goodness, against everyone, even against Loki himself. _‘I thought the world of you.’_ , he said. But, it seems no one can view his true nature and still think him redeemable.

_You’re revolting. A disappointment in everything. Your mother saw it, Thor sees it. That’s why he left you here. He left you here to rot, just like you did to his father._

Loki wanted to tear his brain from his skull.

_Cease with this endless torment! I yield!_ No one came, of course. There was no one who would come for him. But surely, nothing he had ever done could warrant something this harsh. He was going mad. Why must he be subjected to this?

_“Because you remain the same.”_

That’s something Thor had said, wasn’t it, in between all the gloating?

It was true. As everything around him changed, Loki remained, and he was always being passed by. Passed by Thor and passed by everyone else while he continued to stand still. That’s why Thor had seen through his trick. Thor was learning, growing, _maturing_. All while Loki was decidedly not.

But, he wasn’t always like this either. Loki could remember when he was younger, happier. There were many fond memories he and Thor shared as children, even if he loathed to admit it. He could even remember lessons scattered among them. _When had that changed?_ At what point did he stop learning from his mistakes, and start repeating them? It hadn’t even occurred to him before. Probably, because he always tried his damnedest not to think about any of these things.

Unfortunately, he was continuing to find he could do very little to help it. It was like falling, once it began he wouldn’t stop until he hit the ground. Except, this was much worse than that stupid thirty-minute drop the Strange man had forced upon him.

He briefly wondered if Thor had even meant for this to happen and trapped him in his own mind on purpose. His body lurched with a particularly painful zap from the taser. No, probably not.

 

Despite the multitudes of distressing memories already recovered, it seemed that there was one more he had not yet reached. The ground, if you will. And as he drew closer he thought maybe it had been a lie to say his mother’s death had been most traumatic for him, because this memory was much more sinister. One moment which caused him such grief, he had buried it furthest, under a mountain of other unwanted memories as security. Far enough from his thoughts that he might trick himself into forgetting it.

But, when did anything ever go his way?

He had no choice but to continue to fall face first into his worst nightmare.

\-----

After rather shamefully causing the banishment of his brother, Loki stood before a king he had only ever known as ‘father’ and learned he was not his son.

Everything he had ever known was unravelling around him.

There is no way to express the raw emotion coursing through him. He had nothing left. _Oden_ was taking things Loki did not even _know_ could be taken. His once-father might as well reach into his lungs and pull out his breath too.

Oden assured that even if he was not of his flesh Loki was still his son, but Loki did not care for such cheap reassurances. How could he, slayer of frost-giants, love one as his own? And it was not only Odin who hated them so. The whole of Asgard despised the creatures—his _kin_ —and Thor despised them most of all.

He already felt inadequate to his brother. Thor was a light. Bright and volatile like the lightning he commanded. Loki was what? Tricky?

Loki couldn’t touch him.

That’s the whole reason he had let the frost-giants into the palace vault in the first place. If Thor took the crown and became a king, he would be even further from Loki’s reach than he already was. But if Loki was king… Then, Thor would have no choice but to see him as an equal. He did not want Thor to look and see a _hindrance_ , or worse, a child hanging at his heels, he wanted Thor to look at him and see a _man_.

In the end, however, his plan failed. In a grand show of his own incompetence, Loki had gotten Thor banished for all his trouble.

This was not supposed to be happening. It was not what he wanted. You did not take a seer to determine how the events would transpire upon Thor’s return— _if_ Thor returned. His brother would see his foolish little brother, a newly-realized frost-giant, who had planned a _stupid_ , careless stunt that had lead other frost-giants into Asgard, sabotaged his coronation and got him banished (and all of that’s not even to mention what he’s caused to Fandral).

It was at this moment Loki panicked. The feelings he had held (and still held) for his once-brother were…intense. He named them all jealousy because he wouldn’t allow himself to think of the alternative. But, it was a lie told between clenched teeth. He could feel them here in this memory, curling brightly inside him as they had before he had pushed them aside, and this was not jealousy. Remembering this made it easier to remember why he made his choice.

He knew his brother would return to Asgard—maybe not soon, but he would be back—and when he returned, he would take one glance to what Loki had done, and he would reject him for it. Loki could not imagine Thor’s goodness would not stand for anything else.

He had been afraid when Oden told him the truth for many reasons, but above all he feared this, and to avoid this fate, Loki decided he must change his role in this game entirely. Loki knew he could not avoid becoming the antagonist in his brother’s story. But, if that was the price of staying known to him, so be it. Thor could no more reject a powerful foe than he could simply cease to exist. So, that’s what Loki became. He would not be tossed away.

_If I cannot have him by my side, I will have him across the battlefield._ He remembered thinking that, all those years ago. It was with this thought in mind, that he solidified his decision and destroyed anything that could be left of the trust or affection Thor had ever held for him.

Loki was beginning to remember why he wanted to forget.

\----

               He was suddenly, violently, yanked from his thoughts.

_Finally_.

               The pain stopped as the taser on his back fell off and rolled away harmlessly. Loki pushed himself up on unsteady arms and looked up to see the rock monster Thor had befriended holding the remote.

               “Thank you,” Loki said, and he meant it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A very short epilogue leading to the start of Thor's POV.  
> It's very very very short, but I wanted to add it. 
> 
> Thanks and enjoy :)

Loki was en route to Asgard, riding in a rickety dump-truck of a ship, surrounded by a rag-tag group of what looked to be 50 or so of the most incompetent, newly-escaped slaves he had ever laid eyes on (honestly, just after escaping a leadership which was _definitely_ leading them all to slaughter, they come to follow him, a leadership _probably_ leading them all to slaughter). It occurred to him that he may not have thought this one all the way through. But, he did know one thing:

It was all Thor’s fault.

All of it.

Thor had ruined him. Loki could still feel phantom jolts of lighting prickling malevolently underneath his skin, but that wasn’t the worst of it. Ever since Thor had left him lying in that hangar a few hours prior, something had gone wrong with his mind. Suddenly, memories which previously could have been casually batted aside were now making themselves at home in the forefront of his thoughts like rather aggressive squatters. And, if the memories weren’t bad enough, there were _feelings_ bubbling up as well. Feelings for Oden he had chosen to forget, feelings for his mother he did not wish to struggle with a second time, feelings for _Thor_ … It was too much.

He would be concerned it would drive him mad, if he hadn’t felt himself there already.

Loki sighed as he leaned back against the metal wall of the shuttle. He clenched his eyes shut and rubbed circles into his temple. This was unlike him. He was unused to feeling so thoroughly bested. His pride had been wounded when Thor had seen through his ruse, something he hadn’t been able to do until recently. He felt it was understandable that to him, the God of Mischief, being bested with a con by someone as boisterous and straightforward as the God of Thunder had been a sudden and unexpected blow to his ego. That great boor probably did not even realize how soundly he’d won, either.

But, Loki would rather die than let him know he’d succeeded over him.

That’s why he was doing this, as rash of a choice as it was. Thor had been right about him remaining the same, he knew. He had learned his lesson. So, now he was going to prove Thor wrong and go save his idiot brother from this mess that Loki still wasn’t certain wasn’t his fault.

It was a terrible plan. He was most likely going to die horribly in a lot of pain, but amongst the feeling running amok in his mind, one he allowed himself to recognize was fear, and it wasn’t for himself.

Thor had left the trash planet on a ship with no gun and only a self-exiled Valkyrie and Bruce Banner for aid in fighting against their sister, Hela, Goddess of Death, in Asgard, the city from which she draws her power. Even a brute like Thor could not best odds like that. Just the thought of this caused Loki’s traitorous heart beat heavy in his chest. He did not want to be responsible for the death of his brother, and he did not want Thor to _die_. His entire being was screaming against the possibility. And, as he was, he could do nothing, because Thor had left him behind, stuck in some sort of ‘Time-Out from Hel’.

For him, the road ahead to Asgard was long still, but he imagined Thor must already have arrived. Loki sent a silent prayer to his mother for protection. If Thor wasn’t alive when Loki reached him, he would pull him from Valhalla and kill him himself.


End file.
